Trip to High Island Day Two -- Guided Tours

WARNING--LONG POST WITH LOTS OF PICTURES

Thursday, April 11, we were up bright and early.  After breakfast and loading our gear, we were off to High Island. 

As mentioned in a previous blog, the Houston Audubon Society maintains four bird sanctuaries in High Island plus several more on Bolivar Peninsula.  There is also a small sanctuary on High Island owned by the Texas Ornithological Society. 

Admission to the sanctuaries is either by day pass or a patch good for the entire calendar year.  We made it to the kiosk at Boy Scout Woods and bought our patches, which we pinned to our hats.

Patch for admission to the sanctuaries at High Island.  Given the large numbers of previous year patches that some people wore, these seem to be a  collector's item of sorts

We then were ready for the tour at Boy Scout Woods scheduled to start at 8:30.

Frog at the entrance to Boys Scout Woods waiting for the bird walk at 8:30.  You might be able to see the patch on the right side of his hat.  Note all of the trees!!  This was nothing like Anahuac the day before.

The HAS sponsors three free bird walks a day five days a week through the month of April which is the height of the spring migration season.  Most noteworthy, these walks are led by guides from the company Tropical Birding.  This year the guides are Andrés Vásquez, Sam Woods, Ben Knoot and a fourth whose name I have forgotten.  Their biographies are here.  Tropical Birding runs tours and cruises throughout the world.  These professional guides were phenomenal and truly made the entire trip to High Island worthwhile for us.  As rank beginner birders, we would have gotten much less out of our visits without them pointing out birds and finding locations with birds to see.

Morning Bird Walk.  The morning walk was at Boy Scout Woods, a typical spot to observe warblers and other small birds.

This is our bird walk group at the bleachers near the entrance to Boy Scout Woods.  Two of the guides (in the red hats) are in the center.  The kiosk is behind them in the background.

Most of the time we were in pretty thick trees, but there were also some open areas on the south side of the sanctuary.

The Frog with part of our bird walk group at an observation tower and the new raised boardwalk near the southeast corner of Boy Scout Woods.

We did not see many birds.  In fact, the veterans continually commented about how bad the bird turnout was compared to normal. Despite the low bird count, we had a good time and learned a lot due to the great guides.  We made it back to the entrance late morning.

Lunch.  We planned to meet at the entrance to Boy Scout Woods at 12 noon for the next bird walk, a drive down Bolivar Peninsula to see shorebirds.  That gave us over an hour to eat lunch.  Fortunately we had discovered while at home that there were very few (perhaps no?) eating opportunities in High Island.  With that in mind, we had packed the car with lunch supplies.  We were happy to discover that our new Yeti was keeping everything very cold.  We enjoyed a nice lunch in the car parked under the big trees in the parking lot.

Noon Bird Walk.  After a short briefing from the guides at noon, we piled into our cars and followed them down the peninsula to our birding destination, Rollover Pass.  Rollover Pass is about halfway down the peninsula and is the narrowest portion of the peninsula, only about 0.3 mile wide.  According to legend, it was first called Rollover because certain early ship captains preferring to avoid contact with the customs station at Galveston would roll barrels of imported merchandise from the gulf side of Bolivar Peninsula over to East Bay. From there the barrels were transferred to the mainland.

Rollover Pass is also the location of a cut through the peninsula made by the Texas Game and Fish Commission in 1955.  The 200 foot wide, 5 foot deep, 1,600 foot long channel was, according to the plaque at the site, "to introduce into East Bay sufficient quantities of sea water to increase bay water salinity, and to provide additional opportunity for travel of marine fish to and from spawning and feeding areas in the bay." 

The normal travel time to Rollover Pass from High Island is 20-30 minutes.  It took us a bit longer due to construction along the road, Texas Highway  87.  Being only a single two lane road, it meant traffic was reduced to one lane with a flagger.  However, it was the most enjoyable wait for road construction you could imagine since it was right on the ocean.  It appeared to us they were only resurfacing the road.  However, research after we got home indicated they were raising the road from its current elevation of 5.5 feet above sea level to 7.5 feet so that it is less prone to flooding during storms or just high tides.  The state had already abandoned Highway 87 east of  High Island to Sea Rim State Park after it was largely washed out by Hurricane Jerry in 1989.  That is not an option for this much more developed portion of the peninsula that depends on this single road.

The tide was high when we arrived, so there were many birds of all sizes crowded on the shore.

This seemed like a large mishmash of "seagulls" until the guides worked systematically showing us how to identify quite a few different types.

What at first looked to our untrained eyes as a large mass of "seagulls", the guides patiently worked through pointing out at least two kinds of gulls and five kinds of terns.

More terns of various kinds with pelicans and cormorants in the background

Watching at other spots along the shore, we could also see two kinds of pelicans, various sandpipers, multiple kinds of herons and egrets, and an interesting new bird for me with their large multi-colored beaks, black skimmers.

Although we avoided getting really close, the birds did not seem particularly concerned by all of the people hanging around gawking. 

People watching the birds and the birds mostly ignoring the people

The smaller birds were resting while the herons and egrets were more focused on catching fish.

Great Blue Heron with a fish

After another quick stop we headed back to High Island for the last bird walk of the day, the Rookery at Smith Oaks.

Afternoon Photography Walk.  We arrived early at Smith Oaks and looked around a bit before meeting with the guides at 4 for what was billed as a Photography Walk, which is something new this year.

Our specific destination was the Rookery.  Since we were interested in seeing the Rookery and more interested in photography than birding, it sounded perfect.  It was to be led by the professional photographer among the guides, Ben Knoot.

Smith Oaks Sanctuary

Smith Oaks was nice with good boardwalks and very nice bird blinds, at least near the Rookery area.

The Frog at one of the blinds at the Rookery

However the Houston Audubon Society just announced plans for a multi-millionaire dollar improvement which will is scheduled to be finished by next spring.

So what is the Rookery?  The Rookery is an island in the middle of Claybottom Pond where thousands of large water birds such as egrets and herons nest.  The handout at the trailhead indicates at least ten different species of birds nest here: Roseate Spoonbill, Great Egret, Snowy Egret, Cattle Egret, Tricolored Heron, Little Blue Heron, White Ibis, Neotropic Cormorant, Anhinga, and Black-crowned Night Heron.  I think we saw at least seven of the ten species and got pictures of six.

This location is particularly attractive to the birds since the alligators in the pond prevent mammalian predators such as raccoons and coyotes from reaching the island.   According to this account on the Houston Audubon Society page, the development of the site as a rookery was not planned, at least not by the people.  Planned or not, the birds love it.  There have been as many as 13,000 birds on the small island at one time.  There were not that many the days we were there, but there were many.  It was stunning to see how many nests were crowded together, often of different species.

As described on the HAS website there is potentially much to see and hear. 

Every year is different but in an average year, nesting activity starts in March when Great Egrets start spending the day on the island displaying their gorgeous plumes to try to attract a mate. Snowy and Cattle Egrets, Little Blues and Tricolored Herons, White Ibis, Neotropic Cormorants and Spoonbills soon show up and things get real active and noisy. Herons and egrets don't exactly make calls but they do make a lot of different noises and as you are watching nest building you will hear some strange ones. Snowy Egrets make a noise that sounds like gargling -I don't know what it means but you only hear it when they are courting. Neotropic Cormorants oink and some days it sounds just like a barnyard. They oink year round so they not only use the oinking for courting they seem to oink as a greeting in the evenings when they come in to roost. By mid April lots of things are happening, early eggs are hatching, and nest building and displaying are in full swing and you can get a close look at all the activity from the trail around the pond. There is no where else in Texas where you can get such a wonderful look at the home life of colonial waterbirds.

When you visit the Rookery there are lots of the interesting things to watch for; like the stick hunt. With so many birds looking for sticks they are looking everywhere. Tricolors will hover over the pond and pick sticks up out of the water. Great Egrets will walk the trails. And everybody steals sticks from their neighbors when the neighbors aren't watching. Egg turning is another entertaining show. Eggs must be turned regularly to develop properly and some birds turn the eggs easily and quickly but for some it is a big production. Chick feeding, flight training and sibling rivalry are all fun to watch. Predation is also easy to watch but may not be enjoyed by all observers. There are always a few night-heron nests in the rookery and night-herons are predators. They regularly visit neighboring nests, grab unwatched chicks and take them back to their chicks. The other Rookery residents don't seem to pay much attention to the night-herons and aren't as protective as you would like them to be. The birds also aren't as careful around the alligators as you would like them to be. Since you can see the gators lying in the water next to the island you would suppose that the adult birds would see them also. But they wander right down to the shore for a drink and splash they are gone. So some of the show in the Rookery is not for those with a queasy stomach.

The show at sunset is something not to miss. Year round thousands of birds spend the night on the island in Claybottom Pond. This show starts about an hour before sunset when the first birds trickle in, soon it is small flocks, then big flocks then they pour in from all directions. From 1996 - 1998 Peggy Boston and I regularly counted the number of birds coming in to roost and it was a challenging spectacle to record. The night we had the most birds was August 30, 1998 when we counted 13,069. The birds in the sunset light is quite a sight.

I tend to forget I can capture video with my camera, but did take this short video the next day.  Unfortunately it was raining and there were fewer birds and they were less active so it did not capture the frenetic activity that was everywhere around us on Thursday.  This video also did not capture the pig-like oinking sounds of the cormorants which was so prevalent the day before.  Who knew!?  At least there were fewer people in the blind!

We watched a male Great Egret repeatedly bring sticks to a nest.  The female then very carefully positioned each stick exactly where she wanted it.

Great egrets building their nest.  The male disappeared for long periods then reappeared each time with a stick.  The female then took a long time to position precisely where she wanted it in the nest.

We were excited to see many roseate spoonbills.  They are beautiful from a distance, especially in flight, but we were surprised to see how ugly their faces were close up.

It is obvious why they are called spoonbills, but perhaps only a face a mother could love.

It was just the beginning of the nesting season, but at least one of the great egret nests had some little puff balls I could see in the nest when the adult stood up.

Momma tending to the little ones

I could not understand why she kept settling back down on the nest until looking at the pictures at home and realized not quite all of the eggs had hatched.

New baby Great Egrets.  Note the egg on the right that appears to be in the process of hatching.

With all of the things going on in and around the nests it was easy to overlook other birds in the foliage at the foot of the blind.

Purple gallinule just below the blind

After spending a very long time at the first blind, we made a quick dash down to the next blind before we had to leave. 

Part of our photography group with our red hat guide walking above the pond to the next blind

It was closer to the birds, but there were more trees in the way of many of the nests.  However, a highlight was seeing some slightly larger baby egrets.  They look so clumsy and so cute at the same time.

  
While walking down the trail we also caught sight of one of the resident alligators.  I am not sure I could stomach seeing them capturing baby birds that fall out of their nests, but I am glad the alligators are there to scare off the raccoons.


It was unfortunate this was at the end of what had been such a long and busy day because I was getting very tired.  Still I think watching all of the activity at the Rookery was probably my favorite part of the trip to High Island. It was a fantastic end to a great day.  For all of the things we saw today (or at least got pictures for and could identify) see this page on iNat.